The Way You Look Tonight
by inmyeyes
Summary: Tristan POV: He let all those moments pass him by... [IMPROV]


**Disclaimer:** I do not own the characters from Gilmore Girls; they belong to WB and Amy Sherman-Palladino. I'm just borrowing them for a little while. The quotes used are not mine either; I got them off a website.   
**A.N: **I started writing this before the improv came along and did some tiny changes so that it'd fit. :)

Written for _Gilmore Girls Improv _at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/gilmoregirlsimprov/  
**Improv: **opponent --- violet --- silk --- kismet

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**The Way You Look Tonight  
by inmyeyes**

_"Looking back, I have this to regret, that too often when I loved, I did not say so." - David Grayson_

They say that hindsight is 20/20. They're completely right.

I've always thought of myself as a go-getter; if I want something, I'll do anything in my power to get it. I won't rest until it's mine, I won't rest until I've mowed down every single opponent in my way and overcome all the obstacles that separate me from my goal. Some may call it arrogance but I just think that I know what I want. 

It may be a little too late now but I confess: I've wanted Rory Gilmore for the longest time. It seems like I've always wanted her. She was difficult to forget and when I finally managed to cloud my memory enough so that I wouldn't remember what she looked like, how she talked, our one kiss and well… everything else about her that I memorized, fate dealt me a blow.

We met again during our freshman year in Columbia. She was the last person I had expected to see; after all, I knew about her dreams of Harvard and thought that she would have definitely been able to make it there. Yet there she was, at Columbia.

She called out my name and came running up to me, her long chestnut hair billowing out behind her. To my surprise, she engulfed me in a hug and when she pulled away, I was astounded by the genuine happiness I saw in her eyes. She smiled brightly at me and I knew I was gone.

_"I don't know whether to smile because she's my friend or to cry because that's all we'll ever be."_

I don't think that I was in love with her when we were at Chilton and I don't think that I somehow fell in love with her the moment we met at Columbia. She had always intrigued me; she was a kind of mystery that I wanted to solve. Her life was so different from mine, her thinking so untainted and her eyes so bright with innocence that I had immediately been fascinated with her then.

Our time at Columbia gave me the chance to know her, to figure out who she really was without any undue pressure. I was Tristan, she was Rory and we were friends. It was such a simple relationship. And it worked. I don't think anyone knows me half as well as she does. 

Since my life has always been anything but simple, it came as no surprise that our friendship took a complicated turn. 

I fell in love with her.  
  


_"If you love someone you say it, you say it right then, out loud... or the moment just... passes you by." – From 'My Best Friend's Wedding'_

The feeling had crept up so slowly that I didn't even realize it for a while. It hit me one night when we were studying. It was our junior year and our finals were three days away. I remember that we were sitting at a table in the library, amidst all the other students who were also cramming. I looked up from my book; I saw her bent head, her brows furrowed in concentration as she hastily scribbled in her notebook. She pushed back a stray strand of hair and heaved a sigh of frustration. Then she looked up and smiled at me. 

And then it hit me.

It was a really bad time for such a revelation. My mind was so befuddled; thoughts of Rory, random bits of information for my exams and a million questions raging in my mind were not a good combination.

As I look back now, I realize that I should have said something. I should have taken a chance and told her how I felt. 

_"You make me smile for the weirdest reasons, you make me laugh for no reason whatsoever, but most of all you make me love you when I'm not supposed to love you at all."_

There were so many moments that I just let pass me by; the split second when our eyes met while we were laughing over something stupid, that moment between 3:51:28 and 3:51:30 when her smile made my breath catch. Or even the many times we were sitting together, just being… when it felt like everything was right in my world. I should have told her then. I should have done something. 

But for once, the go-getter in me was nowhere to be found.

And now, here I am. It's the kind of late summer day that you never forget, when the skies turn a dark slate blue in preparation for evening time and the sun is warm, but not too warm, there's an air of happiness and all I can hear is the glorious sound of laughter. I'm sitting alone at the table, my fingers twisting the napkin on my lap. Alone, in a sea of smiling faces and bubbling laughter. As the sun finally sets, drowning the area in romantic twilight, the smiling faces and bubbling laughter remains, accompanied by more talk and more champagne.

I don't know what I feel. Fear. Love. Hope. Regret. A reluctant sort of happiness. Pain. It's all one big jumble so I just sit numbly, trying to absorb what's happening around me. 

And then out of nowhere, I see her and she's walking towards me. She's smiling, her eyes bright with happiness and for just a second, I can imagine that her smile is just for me… that all that love I see shining off of her is mine and mine forever. 

Then I blink… and the moment is lost. Reality grips me. 

We banter; it comes so naturally that I don't even have to think about my responses. After a few minutes, and a few snippy comments, she looks at me with her doe eyes and asks me to dance with her.

I can't turn her down, not today. Not ever, I suspect.

_"Have you ever noticed that the worst way to miss someone is when they are right beside you and yet you know you can never have them?"_

I know I won't remember how we got to the middle of the dance floor. I won't even remember what song is playing. What I will remember is the feel of her hair like silk beneath my fingertips and the scent of violets that seems to surround her. I will remember the feel of her small hand in mine and how radiant she looks.

I'll remember her the way she looks tonight. Beautiful, happy and in love. 

As the song dies out, she reaches up and engulfs me in a hug, whispering her thanks. Thank you for being a wonderful friend, she says. Thank you for being here on the happiest day of my life, she gushes. All I can do is hold her a little tighter and say that I wouldn't have dreamed of missing it. 

"You two are a beautiful couple," I force the words out of my mouth. 

She turns a little and I follow her line of sight. Then she turns back to me and my heart clenches at the beauty of the love in her eyes. 

"Everything about Jess and me seems like kismet," she remarks, her voice soft.

I make sure my smile is bright. "It is."

She tilts her head, her smile widening. "Kinda like us. And our friendship."

"Yeah, kinda like us," I agree, keeping the smile on my face. I give her a little push and say teasingly, "You better get back to your husband."

She laughs and the vice around my heart tightens. "Yeah, I should." She pauses before throwing her arms around me. "I love you, Tristan. Thank you for being there for me."

I store her 'I love you' in my mind and reluctantly let her go. 

As she walks away, turning to give me one last smile, I say softly to myself, "Goodbye, Rory Gilmore."

_"…It simply means that you move on and treasure the memories. Letting go doesn't mean giving up, it means accepting that some things weren't meant to be."_

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End file.
